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Vera

Bill Tope

Vera knew that she had to see her father one
last time, in the nursing home where he lay
dying. He hadn’t been in the facility for some
three and a half years, ever since he was
diagnosed with Alzheimer’s.

She had visited him the one time, with her
mother, on the day he was admitted to the
home. He had still been hateful then, and had
cursed her and her mom. Cursed them both
for abandoning him to his fate.

But it had become too hard for her mom to care
for him in the home they’d shared for almost 50
years. His incontinence, his increased dementia
and, most of all, his escalating violence toward
her mom had been just too much for the poor
woman. It had been incumbent upon Vera to see
to his institutionalization. And he’d hated her for
that.

So Vera had eschewed return visits, preferring to
remember him, if not as he was, then as he should
have been. So she found herself in the corridor
outside her dad’s room. The halls were spotless,
but the odor was dreadful, a mixture of vomit,
soiled diapers and worse.

She peeped into his room, found her mother
dutifully occupying the hard wooden chair
provided for visitors, of which her dad had few.
Vera’s mom glanced up and smiled kindly, sadly.
Vera felt an instant wash of guilt. Her mother had
kept the home fires burning these last years,
whereas Vera had fled across the state shortly
after high school, effectively abandoning both of her
parents, just as her father had accused.

Her visits home had been infrequent and then only
to see her mother; she had always reviled her
father. Nor was she encouraged by her mom to
visit; the old woman knew, even then, what was
best. Come home, her mom had said, just this
one last time. But, please hurry. Take a look at
your father, her mom said now, searching Vera’s
eyes for the sunlight of compassion. But finding
none.

Vera stood over the hospital bed, with its threadbare
white blankets and sheets and the saline drip and the
glucose IV and the cardiac monitor and all the rest.
She took a great breath, released it. She looked over
at her mom, remarked that he looked old. He’s 80,
her mom reminded her.

So you’re a sick old man now, thought Vera, and you
can’t hurt me any longer. She frowned. But he was
still vexing her, making her feel unaccountably guilty
for her malice, for the despicable joy she felt in
watching him suffer. Her mind ventured back thirty
years.

When she was just an innocent fourteen. She
remembered this man, this pillar of the community,
had sexually misused her. Again and again. And his
wife, her mother, knew. Vera’s mind had exploded
during those unspeakable months till at length, her
parents had sought counseling. They had resolved
their own dilemma but there was never any counseling
for their daughter. She’s young, she’s resilient, they
thought. Besides, we love her.

Now Vera stared hard down at the old man, his jaw slack,
with the ventilator masking his face. She felt a sudden
urge to violently wrench the wires and tubes keeping him
alive, from his skeletal body and then watch the heart
monitor flatline. You are one sorry sonofabitch, she
thought bitterly. Unexpectedly, her mom approached her
from behind, touched her gently on the shoulder. Her
hand felt warm.

“Your father really did love you, you know,” her mother
murmured. “I know,” said Vera, “and that’s the hardest
part.” She paused for a moment, then said no, the
hardest part is that she still loved him—damn him!!
And tears brimmed in Vera’s eyes and then flowed
unashamedly down her cheeks.

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